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Nuclear Science Division

Raúl Briceño awarded the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE)

Raúl Briceño, a faculty scientist in the Nuclear Sciences Division’s Nuclear Theory Group and an assistant professor of physics at UC Berkeley, is one of three Berkeley Lab scientists to receive the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government on outstanding scientists and engineers early in their careers.

Element 116 efforts featured in two articles

The recent success of efforts by staff in the Accelerator-Based Low-Energy Program to produce element 116, a critical milestone in the search for element 120, has garnered much attention. An article about the achievement was recently published by the Washington Post (paywalled).

A second article, this one published by APS’s This Week in Physics, presents a brief overview of the search for superheavy elements, inspired by the latest LBNL results.

NSD’s Nuclear Data Group becomes the Nuclear Data Program

The Nuclear Science Division is pleased to announce that the Nuclear Data Group in the Accelerator-Based Low-Energy Program will be reclassified as the  Nuclear Data Program, effective November 1st, 2024. This decision reflects the scientific and financial independence of the nuclear data efforts at LBNL.

The elevation of the Program also serves as recognition of its leading role in the national and international nuclear data communities, and the growth of nuclear data initiatives in basic and applied research. With this change comes the appointment of Prof. Lee Bernstein as the Nuclear Data Program Head and Mathis Wiedeking as his Program Deputy.

The program, with its strong connection to the UC Berkeley Department of Nuclear Engineering, will continue to address the data needs of the basic and applied nuclear science community while training the next generation of nuclear scientists and engineers.

Nuclear Data

Program Head: Lee Bernstein
Program Deputy: Mathis Wiedeking

The goal of the Bay Area Nuclear Data Program is to address the data needs of the basic and applied nuclear science community while training the next generation of nuclear scientists and engineers in the process.  We do this through a combination of experimental and evaluation activities. Most of our experimental work takes place at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory 88-Inch Cyclotron or at the Nuclear Technology Innovation Laboratory within the UC Berkeley Department of Nuclear Engineering

The Bay Area Nuclear Data Program works closely with the Bay Area Neutron Group (BANG) led by Bethany Goldblum and the Nuclear Science and Security Consortium (NSSC) on a wide variety of nuclear data, security, and education-related efforts.

Our research areas include:

For more information, please visit our group page (external link).

2024 Berkeley Lab Director’s Awards honor PSA staff members

Congratulations to Physical Sciences Area staff members who have received 2024 Berkeley Lab Director’s Awards.

The Berkeley Lab Prize – Lifetime Achievement Award was bestowed upon two of the Area’s senior scientists:

  • Kevin Lesko, a Senior Physicist in the Physics Division and former spokesperson for LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) Dark Matter Experiment, was honored for his “extraordinary contributions to pioneering neutrino and dark-matter experiments and establishing an international underground scientific laboratory for scientific explorations and STEM workforce training.”
  • Kai Vetter, former head of the Nuclear Science Division’s (NSD) Applied Nuclear Physics Group, received the award in recognition of his “career-spanning achievements in radiation detection and imaging, his impact on science and society, and his commitment to developing the next generation of scientific leaders.”

The 2024 Director’s Awards for Exceptional Achievement were presented to PSA staff members and teams in several categories.

Ina Reichel, the ATAP Division’s IDEA, Outreach & Education Coordinator, received a 2024 IDEA Community Award “for collaborative, consensus-driven leadership and a combination of a scientific approach and tireless effort in driving positive change to make Berkeley Lab a more attractive and equitable workplace, as well as for extensive and selfless work in STEM outreach.”

A 2024 IDEA Community Award was also bestowed upon the NSD IDEA Council (2022) members Mark Bandstra (Research Scientist in the Applied Nuclear Physics Group), Heather Crawford (Senior Scientist in the Nuclear Structure research group), Tom Gallant (Division Deputy for Operations), and Ernst Sichtermann (Senior Scientist in the Relativistic Nuclear Collisions Program), who were honored “for championing the reduction of the stigma of mental illness by proposing a change to the Lab’s sick leave policy to explicitly support sick leave for mental illness.”

Paolo Ferracin, Senior Scientist and Program Deputy in ATAP’s Superconducting Magnet Program, received the 2024 IDEA Outreach Award “for exemplary dedication and commitment in proactive teaching and mentorship at levels ranging from high schools to graduate particle accelerator schools, offering education not available through traditional venues— in addition to a demanding job as a research leader.”

The 2024 Director’s Award for Exceptional Achievement in Safety was awarded to the Multi-Lab Safety Week Leadership Team – Asmita Patel (ATAP Division Deputy for Operations) and Patricia Thomas (former ATAP Safety Coordinator) – “for the visionary leadership that created ATAP Safety Day and evolved it into the present Multi-Lab Safety Week, which offers an annual safety-culture reset and enriched learning opportunities to multiple Divisions at Berkeley Lab and three other national laboratories.”

Berkeley Lab’s HL-LHC-AUP Cabling Core Team received a 2024 Director’s Award for Exceptional Scientific Achievement “for leadership and performance in completing the large, complex, and technically challenging multi-year Cabling Task of the High-Luminosity LHC Accelerator Upgrade Project (HL-LHC-AUP). This DOE 413.3b project greatly enhances the LHC’s position as the forefront particle accelerator for high-energy physics.” The team members are Stephanie Chan Shum, Jean-Francois Croteau, Paolo Ferracin, Chris Georgiou, Hugh Higley, Andy Lin, Mike Naus, Asmita Patel, Ian Pong, Soren Prestemon, and Patricia Thomas from the ATAP Division; Elaine Buron and Elizabeth Lee from the Engineering Division; and George Fraley, Karen Lingua, and Brian Zatkow from the Office of the Chief Financial Officer.

The 2024 Director’s Achievement Awards ceremony will be held on Friday, November 8, at 3:00 PM PT via livestream video and in Berkeley Lab’s Building 50 Auditorium, where there will be a reception immediately following. Add this event to your calendar.

Passing of Rick Firestone

It is with great sadness that we learned of the passing of Rick Firestone on September 9th.


Rick was a titan in the nuclear data world.  In addition to his seminal work in the 8th edition of the table of isotopes, Rick was a visionary regarding the importance of neutron capture and scattering data who constantly pushed the nuclear structure evaluation community to think outside of its normal confines.   He was also a wonderful mentor with an insatiable curiosity and sense of humor.  He will be sorely missed.